Sources: last month, Mark Zuckerberg agreed to show users positive stories about Facebook via News Feed; Facebook says it ran a small test with labeled posts

Mark Zuckerberg, the chief executive, has signed off on an effort to show users pro-Facebook stories and to distance himself from scandals.

New York Times 2021-09-22

Context & Ripple Effects

Facebook had already treated News Feed as a governance lever: Zuckerberg approved a temporary post-election change that gave authoritative outlets greater prominence, after an earlier shift toward friend-shared content over publisher posts. The reported test adds Facebook-favorable material to that same distribution mechanism.

The effort also fits Zuckerberg’s broader plan to repair Facebook’s image through his own public presence. Facebook says the feed posts were labeled and limited to a small test.

First-order effects

Facebook can use News Feed distribution to place labeled favorable coverage in front of users, while Zuckerberg gains a product-level channel for distancing himself from scandals.
Publishers and other sources of favorable Facebook coverage receive potential additional distribution within a feed that Facebook controls.

Second-order effects

The test further blurs the operational line between News Feed’s ranking role and Facebook’s corporate communications, making labels central to how Facebook distinguishes promoted material from ordinary recommendations.
Facebook’s prior post-election boost for authoritative news shows that publishers’ reach can change with company-directed ranking interventions, rather than only with audience engagement.

Third-order effects

If repeated, company-directed feed campaigns would make News Feed a more explicit instrument for corporate reputation management alongside its roles in news distribution and policy enforcement.
The pattern points to a platform-governance model in which Facebook responds to political, reputational, and content-policy pressures by adjusting ranking and disclosure within the product.

The trend: Facebook is increasingly using News Feed’s ranking and labeling controls to manage both the information environment and its own public standing.

Discussion

@rmac18 @rmac18 on x
Since the start of 2021, Facebook has taken a more aggressive approach to crisis response. As part of that Mark Zuckerberg recently approved an initiative to run pro-FB content and news stories in the News Feed under an initiative called “Project Amplify.” https://www.nytimes.com…
@joeosborne Joe Osborne on x
The story the Times could've written is that Facebook ran a small test of an informational unit on Facebook in three cities — clearly labeled as from Facebook on the top of the unit. Here's one image: https://twitter.com/...
@sheeraf Sheera Frenkel on x
New story with @rmac18! No More Apologies: Inside Facebook's Push to Defend Its Image: https://www.nytimes.com/...
@joeosborne Joe Osborne on x
The story salaciously implies we are using News Feed to improve our image, and yet, NYT intentionally clipped my statement which clearly said on the record: “There is zero change to News Feed ranking.” This wasn't important to readers? https://twitter.com/...
@joeosborne Joe Osborne on x
There is nothing surprising about a New York Times story that attempts to villainize Facebook for telling its side of the story — but this article includes such clear falsehoods that were clearly refuted that even we are surprised. https://twitter.com/...
@joeosborne Joe Osborne on x
It leads with a report of a Jan mtg, which I refuted to Ryan on record, but he left out my statement: “This meeting never happened.” Yet, here is a description of a fake meeting in the NYT, with no named people in attendance or any named source claiming it ever happened. https://…
@alexeheath Alex Heath on x
really just incredible on many levels https://twitter.com/...
@juliacarriew Julia Carrie Wong on x
This man's product was used to foment a genocide and he did nothing to stop it https://twitter.com/...
@juanof9 Juan Ortiz Freuler on x
@WillOremus I think the problem is that the term “NewsFeed” can be used to signify the ranking algorithm as well as the space in which content is placed for people to scroll through. I think the average user interprets NewsFeed as the space, & those of us in sector as the algorit…
@bernstein Joe Bernstein on x
Again, I think the original propaganda coup of these folks, assisted by our industry, was convincing the world that they are geniuses
@bernstein Joe Bernstein on x
Like many of the damning stories about Facebook from the past week, this reveals what appears to be less a group of sinister masterminds and more a group of bumbling morons https://www.nytimes.com/...
@wongmjane Jane Manchun Wong on x
Can someone tell Zuck to just come to Twitter and exchange with @RMac18 directly? 🤣 https://www.facebook.com/... https://twitter.com/...
@jeffjarvis Jeff Jarvis on x
NYT's tech moral panic strikes again. Note well that The Times runs its own ads promoting itself and its virtues. But they are shocked—shocked!— that Facebook would engage in PR to tell its side of the story when it is under attack. https://twitter.com/...
@kombiz Kombiz Lavasany on x
@alexeheath Posting through it as therapy
@rmac18 @rmac18 on x
So.... he read the story and this is what he's disputing https://www.nytimes.com/... https://twitter.com/...
@rmac18 @rmac18 on x
If this is a joke, it's an interesting one to make considering he has a board member who secretly financed a lawsuit to destroy a publication, something Zuckerberg has never commented on. https://twitter.com/...
@clarajeffery Clara Jeffery on x
THIS is their takeaway? JFC this company is full of utter delusional sociopaths. https://www.nytimes.com/... https://twitter.com/...
@bcmerchant Brian Merchant on x
Facebook is irredeemable, it's that simple https://twitter.com/...
@scout_finch Jennifer Hayden on x
Regulate this company. https://twitter.com/...
@alexeheath Alex Heath on x
Lmao this is a new tactic https://www.facebook.com/...
@oliverdarcy Oliver Darcy on x
Big story from NYT on Facebook's comms strategy: https://twitter.com/...
@cramforce Malte Ubl on x
@wongmjane OMG, the replies are cringe
@mrinaldesai Mrinal Desai on x
Rhetorically curious - should “their news” have been labeled as misinformation? 😁 https://twitter.com/...
@katieharbath Katie Harbath on x
Never a dull moment in Facebook land. We shouldn't be surprised that Facebook is taking a stronger role defending itself - no one else is certainly going to. https://twitter.com/...
@thekenyeung Kenyeung Eth on x
“They're realizing that no one else is going to come to their defense, so they need to do it and say it themselves,” said Katie Harbath, a former Facebook public policy director. https://www.nytimes.com/...
@aaronhuertas Aaron Huertas on x
This is even funnier if you remember Facebook suppressing positive viral content from websites like @Upworthy. They're monopolizing the good vibes! https://twitter.com/...
@rmac18 @rmac18 on x
Deciding “to focus more on some of the awesome things we're building” and not having his image tied to Facebook's constant crises, is a major part of the story we reported. Appreciate the confirmation from the top. https://twitter.com/...
@jrubinblogger Jennifer ‘pro-voting’ Rubin on x
“less conciliatory when responding to crises and decided there would be less apologizing”... LESS? https://www.nytimes.com/...
@mmasnick Mike Masnick on x
FB deserves tons of criticism for so (so, so) many things, but after seeing this image, it certainly suggests the NY Times oversold its story today. This... does not seem nefarious (or, honestly, even newsworthy). https://twitter.com/...
@timothydurigan Timothy Durigan on x
@sheeraf @RMac18 Will these articles be tagged as “promoted” like other advertisers' posts?
@karaswisher Kara Swisher on x
This is the it's-a-PR-problem disease many tech companies suffer from — see old Uber — rather than focusing on the actual problem that needs fixing. But, as former Netscape exec Jim Barksdale said: The main thing is to keep the main thing, the main thing https://www.nytimes.com/.…
@matthewstoller Matt Stoller on x
Facebook is the story of a mean little boy who keeps setting fire to things and the parents keep fighting about who should stop him. https://twitter.com/...
@hardin Brandon Hardin on x
Facebook is just like all of us. It wants to be looked at without being perceived. “The Markup has found evidence that Facebook is adding changes to its code that foils automated data collection of news feed posts, a technique used to audit the platform. https://themarkup.org/...…
@quinnypig Corey Quinn on x
That must be why everyone just loves Facebook now. https://twitter.com/...
@hshaban Hamza Shaban on x
This story frames Facebook's new PR approach as if the company once thought apologizing and promising transparency would satisfy its critics. Another revealing episode of how some tech execs view the role of public interest journalism and of criticism. https://www.nytimes.com/...
@johnpaczkowski John Paczkowski on x
Lol. Remember when Facebook overhauled news feed to focus on what friends and family share? https://twitter.com/...
@mollywood Molly Wood on x
I mean honestly, you have to laugh. It's like this insane fragile ego story, where the sting of bad press causes this company to sabotage and corrupt itself over and over, instead of just being quiet and collecting its literally planetary amounts of money. https://twitter.com/...
@nickbilton Nick Bilton on x
I saw this and thought it was Photoshopped, but it's not. After a slew of stories about Facebook's incredibly harmful impact on society (and teens), Zuckerberg responds by complaining that he's on a “hydrofoil,” not an electric surfboard... and with a 🤣 in the comments. https://t…
@etbrooking Emerson T. Brooking on x
We would rightly be concerned if a newspaper - one that had effectively destroyed all competing newspapers - used its column-inches to instruct readers how great and generous it was. https://twitter.com/...
@wadhwa Vivek Wadhwa on x
When authoritarian states do this, it is called “propaganda”. Is the company going to try to mass brainwash the entire population now—with the misinformation it generates? https://twitter.com/...
@rmac18 @rmac18 on x
Zuckerberg has said nothing publicly about the WSJ investigations and the only thing he's disputed in our story about him wanting him to separate himself from scandals was a post about his hydrofoil, which... ok. The story has been updated too. https://www.nytimes.com/... https:/…
@janelytv Jane Lytvynenko on x
The unsetting part about this scoop is that Facebook's newsfeed is very opaque, so if it's bumping its own propaganda, it would be very difficult to know from the outside. Especially, as Ryan and Sheera note, with the cuts to public data availability. https://twitter.com/...
@quinnypig Corey Quinn on x
Nick Clegg will be out to rebut this with an ill-conceived blog post just as soon as he can find his clown suit. https://twitter.com/...
@bcmerchant Brian Merchant on x
At this point, we have all the evidence we need that Facebook is not reformable; it cannot be trusted to govern itself in any capacity and its influence remains vast—the conversation has to move to how to shut it down; whether to break apart, nationalize or regulate into oblivion
@neilturkewitz Neil Turkewitz on x
@bcmerchant @hypervisible The bigger question is...is the internet irredeemable?
@mattyglesias Matthew Yglesias on x
Just wait until they do this to promote favorable coverage of politicians who offer them favorable tax policy. https://twitter.com/...
@slightlylate Alex Russell on x
Give Zuck his due; this is absolutely going to increase (regulatory) engagement: https://www.nytimes.com/...
@clarajeffery Clara Jeffery on x
Facebook pushing pro Facebook stories into your Facebook feed because the WSJ and other investigations roiling it are so bad. Just another reason why Facebook is a garbage company: https://www.nytimes.com/...
@willoremus Will Oremus on x
I've deleted the tweet below because on closer read, it's not clear from the NYT's reporting that Facebook promoted these stories “secretly” or changed its algorithm to detect and uprank pro-FB content. If all the promoted content was labeled, that's not nearly as troubling. http…
@alexeheath Alex Heath on x
Very interesting comments! https://twitter.com/...
@rmac18 @rmac18 on x
So to be clear: Project Amplify, in this iteration, does not involve any algorithm changes to news feed (which we don't say in the story). But it still involves Facebook pushing pro-FB content into News Feeds in a pre-determined fashion to boost its reputation.
@mattnavarra Matt Navarra on x
This will make the Facebook... haters hate harder. Journalists dig deeper. And regulators more determined Facebook users won't like feeling they've been manipulated by Facebook. Again. This is straying back into black mirror territory. Again. https://twitter.com/...
@thekenyeung Kenyeung Eth on x
Great, more misinformation in my News Feed. https://www.nytimes.com/...
@eric_seufert Eric Seufert on x
No company in US history has received as much impotent rage as Facebook. The company is ceaselessly pilloried by the press — over & over again, over issues that arent unique to it and which are baked into consumer perception — and yet every quarter it prints money unperturbed htt…
@jathansadowski Jathan Sadowski on x
Last month Zuckerberg signed off on Project Amplify, which uses Facebook's News Feed to push stories—some written by Facebook—meant “to improve the company's image in the eyes of its users.” FB already has a “supreme court,” so why not its own COINTELPRO https://www.nytimes.com/.…
@blakehounshell Blake Hounshell on x
This is eerily similar to a plot line on “Silicon Valley” https://twitter.com/...

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